The Nigerian Shippers’ Council has entered into a strategic partnership with Niger Republic and Republic of Chad to ensure that cargoes destined for these countries transit through Nigerian ports.
Executive Secretary of the Shippers Council; Mr Hassan Bello stated this last week when the Council was visited by members of the Senate Committee on Marine Transport.
He however blamed terminal operators and shipping companies for cargo diversion to ports of neighbouring countries.
Bello said that the Council was not comfortable with the fact that Niger Republic will go all the way to Cote d’ Ivoire and Ghana to transit it’s cargoes when Nigeria is closer to the land-locked country.
The Shippers Council boss also stressed that his team was approached by Chad recently during the United African Shippers Council (UASC) conference which held in Ghana, he said that notwithstanding the security challenges in the North, Chad is ready to partner Nigeria in transiting the country’s cargoes.
“Under the Nigeria-Niger Joint Commission, the Council is encouraging Niger Republic economic operators to utilize the Nigerian transit corridor for their imports and exports. You can imagine Niger Republic going all the way to Cote d’ Ivoire and Ghana to pass their cargoes”
“They are a land-locked country, so that is where their cargo comes from, it doesn’t make sense, the destination should be Nigeria so that we can move the cargoes, we can use our trucks and even employ people to move these cargoes, but because that time our ports were not efficient, but now our ports are reasonably efficient, we have been talking with Niger, soon they will start shipping their consignments through Nigeria, this is the effort of the Nigerian Shippers Council”, he told the lawmakers.
Speaking further on the inroad that the Council has secured on transit cargoes, Bello added that: “And at the meeting in Ghana we were approached by Chad also, despite the security problems, we want them to also use Nigeria as transit for its Cargo”.
He however lamented that the operational efficiencies achieved from the port concession exercise in Nigeria is being eroded by excessive and high charges, abuse of agreement by terminal operators and shipping companies.
He said that terminal operators had a field day because there was nobody to check what they were doing.
“So the Federal Government appointed the Nigerian Shippers Council as economic regulator because there was none, NPA could not regulate because NPA are landlords, they have services they charge for, so they cannot regulate at the same time”, he explained.
Drawing a comparison in port charges in Nigeria and other neighbouring ports, Bello stressed the need for Nigerian port operators to bring down their charges in order to bring back the cargoes lost to Cotonou port and others.
Dwelling on statistics, he told the Senators, “In Apapa port, the dwell time is19 to 25 days, in Cotonou it is 12 to 14days, in Mombasa; Kenya it is five days and in Durban it is four days. In Nigeria, after three days they start charging you, but in Benin Republic they give you seven days, in Ghana it’s 11days and in Cameroun it’s 11days, so we have introduced seven days, but the matter is being contested in court”
“Terminal handling charges in Nigeria is 67, 500, in Benin it is 24,000, in Ghana it is 9,000, this is why goods are going through neighbouring ports, what our terminal operators do not understand is that we are in competition with many ports, so we have to reduce the charges, you have to increase efficiency and be competitive in order to attract cargoes to Nigeria.”
“The demurrage free period in Nigeria is five days, Benin is 10days, Ghana seven, Cameroun 10”
“Nobody says charges could not be fixed, there is no rigidity in charges, but they cannot increase without notifying us” he insisted.
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